This disclosure relates to a gas turbine engine airfoil assembly. More particularly, the disclosure relates to blades or vanes that include at least one CMC portion secured to other portions. The other portions may be produced from material other than CMC.
Gas turbine engines typically include a compressor section, a combustor section and a turbine section. During operation, air is pressurized in the compressor section and is mixed with fuel and burned in the combustor section to generate hot combustion gases. The hot combustion gases are communicated through the turbine section, which extracts energy from the hot combustion gases to power the compressor section and other gas turbine engine loads.
Both the compressor and turbine sections may include alternating series of rotating blades and stationary vanes that extend into the core flow path of the gas turbine engine. For example, in the turbine section, turbine blades rotate and extract energy from the hot combustion gases that are communicated along the core flow path of the gas turbine engine. The turbine vanes, which generally do not rotate, guide the airflow and prepare it for the next set of blades.
Ceramic matrix composite (CMC) materials have been increasingly proposed for high temperature applications such as blades and vanes in the hot section of the engine as the industry pursues higher maximum temperature engine designs. Many of the proposed blade and vane designs are not practical in that CMC material is stiff and cannot be easily formed to allow for the creation of more complex geometry of blades and vanes. In particular, CMC materials do not form well along sharp angles and radii. Thus, producing CMC blades and vanes is difficult as a practical matter.